Testimony

 

Hey, Cobblestone,

 

    On the advice of a dear friend, here’s our next object of redemption: your testimony. “Testimony” isn’t a word that rolls off your tongue very often? I wouldn’t be surprised. It doesn’t roll off mine very often either, and given my line of work, that could be a problem! If so, maybe the first logical step toward a solution is to explain what I mean by testimony. In the context of today’s letter, it’s the story of how Jesus got a-hold of you. Every Christian has a testimony. Every story is different, yet closely related – Jesus is the central figure; his sacrifice on the cross was totally sufficient; his lordship is evident in the life of the believer; his resurrection guarantees every Christian’s resurrection. But testimonies tend to wander off course, into a place where the believer is the central figure – it happens even to the most devoted among us, so don’t beat yourself up too badly, please. I’m simply offering a suitable point for entering into the redemption of testimony.

     By way of reminder, the central question in this “Three R’s” series is, “At the intersection of faith and culture, what should we do with a given cultural element – Receive it as all good, Reject it as all bad, or Redeem it from whatever bad (or sideways) purposes it may have been put to?” Given that we are, every one of us, plunked down into a particular culture, testimony becomes a cultural element because we are part of the culture into which we’ve been plunked. How, Christian, will your testimony affect those around you – believer as well as unbeliever?

     Receive and Reject have consistently been the easiest options to turn into non-options; let’s see if the pattern holds. Some of our testimonies have shifted into a story of self-improvement. Sure, Jesus is the one who empowers the improvement, but he doesn’t get top billing. Any story that casts Jesus as an accessory can’t be Received as all good. And how about Reject – should testimony be avoided altogether? The most direct answer I know of is found in Psalm 107, verse 2… Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story – those he redeemed from the hand of the foe. Satan was destroying you, but the Lord redeemed you, and now you have a story to tell. Once again, Redeem is the one option remaining. Whether your testimony needs a tune-up or an overhaul, there’s a path to redeeming it.

     I’d be hard pressed to decide on a favorite testimony from Scripture – there are so many – but for our chat today, I’ll pick two front-runners: Psalm 73, partly because it’s in our Bible reading plan this week; and Acts 26, because it gives a simple and repeatable pattern for testimony.

     In Acts 26, the apostle Paul has been arrested for preaching Jesus, and he’s making his defense before no less than King Agrippa. Also present were his accusers, and as I read the story, I like to imagine Paul taking a few pokes at them even as he persuades the king. But in essence he’s simply telling his salvation story, which divides cleanly into three parts: 1)“I was __________”; 2) “But God ___________”; 3) “and now ___________.” In verses 9-11 he describes what he did “in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth”. In verses 12-18 he tells of how Jesus found him on the road to Damascus, “to appoint (him) as a servant and a witness”. In verses 19-23 he declares, “I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision…” and “to this day I have had the help that comes from God”.

     It wouldn’t be difficult to feel very small in light of such a large testimony. But largeness and smallness are neither one the point. The point is Jesus. By sheer verse count, I hope you noticed there’s more about Jesus than anything else. The pattern is totally repeatable:

I was __________.

But God ____________________________________.

And now ______________.

The blanks are yours to fill in.

     Likewise, Psalm 73 constitutes what you might call a believer’s ongoing testimony, the story of God’s moment-by-moment help in navigating life here below, where the devil has come down to you in great wrath (Revelation 12:12). The pattern of Acts 26 is recognizable:

…my feet had almost stumbled,

      my steps had nearly slipped.

For I was envious of the arrogant

     when I saw the prosperity of the wicked…

I was brutish and ignorant;

     I was like a beast toward you (verses 2-3, 22).

In other words: “I was _________.”

 

Nevertheless, I am continually with you;

     you hold my right hand.

You guide me by your counsel,

     and afterward you will receive me to glory.

Whom have I in heaven but you?

     And there is nothing on earth I desire besides you.

My flesh and my heart may fail,

     but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever (verses 23-27).

There’s the hard pivot I mentioned last week: “But God _______________.”

 

But for me it is good to be near God;

     I have made the Lord God my refuge,

     that I may tell of all your works (the 28^th and final verse).

“And now _______________.”

 

    Best I can tell, a Christian’s testimony typically suffers from one of two maladies, opposite yet equally troublesome. One is the nagging suspicion that the blood of Jesus wasn’t sufficient for the forgiveness of all the believer’s sins; some were (or will be) too horrible. The other is the nagging suspicion that the believer hasn’t (or won’t) commit any sins so horrible as to require the blood of Jesus. If there’s a third malady, maybe it has to do with simply not feeling equipped. But I would still contend that the third has its roots in one of the first two, and some honest digging will expose them. Probably the best news about giving a testimony is that, as much as it has to do with you, it’s not about you – it’s about Jesus: you were bought with a price (1Corinthians 6:20). I’m hoping that takes most of the pressure off.

     My friend was worried about her testimony not being effective in the lives of others. As we talked, I had some of the same worries about my own, and could remember times when it seemed especially weak. We’re taking the conversation as a nudge from the Holy Spirit – to make our own testimonies more Jesus-centric and God-honoring, and urge other Christians to do the same. Pointing to the “large” example of Paul, there’s no evidence in Acts 26 that King Agrippa became a Christian, even with Paul’s persuasion. One thing odd about giving testimony is that we don’t get to hear – this side of heaven anyway – the rest of all the stories.

     But based on God’s faithfulness, one thing we can be sure of: the more we give it the more redemptive it becomes.

  

Grace and Peace (and re-acquaintance with your Jesus-got-me story),

 

John